HAI pump: Unique liver cancer treatment gives hope for those with inoperable tumors

In 2021, a colonoscopy revealed that Grady Hebert had colon cancer. Surgery to remove it and traditional chemotherapy cured him, but in late 2022, it came back and spread to the liver. His doctors told the Florida father of two that it was inoperable, but he refused to give up. This led him to Sepideh Gholami, MD, and Northwell's new Hepatic Artery Infusion (HA) pump program in New York, which saved his life.

HAI is a device that delivers high doses of chemotherapy — as much as 400 times that of traditional chemotherapy — directly to tumors in the liver via the hepatic artery. The pump is about the size of a hockey puck and gets refilled every few weeks. The targeted liver chemotherapy also limits potential side effects to the body.

Dr. Gholami, is surgical director of the Northwell Cancer Institute’s Liver Multidisciplinary Clinic and director of the center’s Hepatic Artery Infusion Pump Program. She developed the targeted liver cancer therapy program at Northwell.

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